Yuri Manga: Bloom Into You, Volume 4 (English)

February 27th, 2018

In Bloom Into You, Volume 4, as the Student Council goes into a stay-over training camp in order to work on their play for the school festival, the principal characters encounter issues they’ve brought with them from their past into their present. 

Sayaka is forced to deal with a memory being pissed all over by her first lover. The sempai, in attempting to absolve Sayaka of any blame for their gay relationship, forces her to use Touko to make a point about being gay anyway. Touko doesn’t mind, but the whole thing is awkward and uncomfortable. Sayaka’s then brought into close quarters with the girl she desires, but cannot have. She cannot not see Touko’s interactions with Yuu, she cannot not know what they mean. She has no course at all but to be stoic, which is in unfair step down from just having an unrequited fantasy. I am still primarily reading this series for Sayaka and really want to see her happy by the end of it.

Yuu learns from a friend and teammate from middle school that her current state of dissatisfaction at being overworked with Student Council stuff marks a pretty major shift from her previous lack of engagement with pretty much everything. I read too much manga, I know, but my mind went directly to another MediaWorks manga that used pathological lack of engagement as a plot complication, Kashimashi Girl Meets Girl. Is this a key development moment for Yuu, or just a thing that is told to us to explain her ambivalence? Unfortunately for readers, we cannot be sure if anything we’re presented has weight of meaning. It could easily be a handwave.

We can be sure that something came to some kind of head when we all see Touko get extraordinarily emotional as they rehearse the play. Kanou-san just got way too close to the truth (as Yuu notes privately,) with her script. Touko is competing with the ideal of a dead older sister  who turns out to have actually been a bit of a jerk. She learns her sister used the people around her and is then told, quite incorrectly, that she’s nothing like Mio. But we readers can see that she is much more like her sister than anyone knows.

If the book took a direction that made me happy, Touko would confront her own behavior in regards to Yuu and change. Yuu would be then given a chance to decide if she wanted to be with this Touko. And Sayaka would meet a nice girl. But realistically, I’m just waiting for the magic handwave that will make Yuu decide she loves Touko and they’ll get married on a rainbow-bathed chapel in the sky. Oh, sorry, switched to Kashimashi again. 

Seven Seas has given us an excellent, authentic manga reading experience with this volume, so we can relax and be perplexed by the story. ^_^

Ratings: (quote directly from the review of the JP volume)

Art – 8
Story – 5 This issue has issues
Characters – 8 
Yuri – 7
Service – 4 Bathing scenes with three girls, two of whom are lesbian.

Overall – 8….

I really want to like this series. I just still don’t know if I do. Huh, just like Yuu feels about Touko. How ironic. ^_^

Volume 5 in English hits shelves in June 2018.  Thanks very much to Seven Seas for a review copy, but I had already gotten it for myself. ^_^

Posted in Bloom Into You / Yagate Kimi ni Naru, English Manga, Nakatani Nio, Yuri Manga | 5 Comments »


Nagareikusha: Moribito Short Story Collection (流れ行く者: 守り人短編集 )

February 25th, 2018

If you, like me, enjoyed the Moribito novel series, and the Seirei no Moribito anime and the Moribito live-action series, (all of which are reviewed here on Okazu) you may, like me, have wondered what kind of life Balsa had when she was a child.

Balsa was a child when her father was the doctor for the king. When he died (not explicitly stated, but implied) by being poisoned by his son, that son took the throne and commanded his personal guards to kill the doctor and his family. The leader of the personal guard was a man named Jigoro, and was Balsa’s father’s best friend. Balsa’s father knew he would be killed, so he asked Jigoro to save Balsa. Jigoro killed the rest of the guard – his brothers and sisters in arms – and ran away with Balsa.

It is apparent from Balsa’s own training of Chagum that Jigoro was a harsh teacher, but equally apparent that she loved him. In Yami no Moribito, we also learn that he deeply resented her because his promise to her father meant that he had to kill his friends. She, fully aware of this, spent her life saving lives as a bodyguard, to atone for the deaths her life caused.

In Nagareikusha: Moribito Short Story Collection (流れ行く者: 守り人短編集 ), the last of the Moribito series (so far), we follow young Balsa as she and Jigoro wander along with other bodyguards, mercenaries, cuthroats and commoners.

The first story shows us a young Tanda, runty for his age, and already with one foot in the other world and a lot of knowledge of healing and Balsa undergoing a mystical experience.

We see Jigoro suffering from an infection as the result of being fought too hard and too long against too many people, by a man he hired himself out to for room and board, and Balsa struggle to buy medicine to break the fever. As Jigoro regains health, Balsa is fostered by a woman of the village, who teaches her local crafts and who is very kind to her. In this story, another girl of the village is being harassed by some youths who have come to the inn Balsa and Jigoro are staying at. When Balsa defeats their leader, the girl develops a little crush on Balsa. But by the time they leave, she’s moved on to a local boy and Balsa and she part as friends. ^_^

They travel with mercenaries who work for an abusive lord, who eventually challenges Balsa. She scores first blood. When they escort him back to his home, he expects them to come in, but without a word the mercenaries turn their back on this jealous and petty lord, riding off.

The next to last chapter follows Balsa and Jigoro traveling with a group of soldiers. Balasa is taken under the wing of an older guy. He’s always showing her good vantage points and giving her advice. But when he turns to criminal endeavor and she finds out, she’s forced to defend herself against him to the death. We watch as young Balsa kills a man for the first time.

And, at last, in the final pages, she returns to Tanda’s village…and Tanda…for respite.

Ratings:

Overall – 8

I kind of hope there’ll be more in the future, but it’s always a pleasure to spend time with female bodyguard and Guardian, Balsa.

Posted in Novel | 2 Comments »


Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – February 24, 2018

February 24th, 2018

Yuri Manga

Via YNN Correspondent Alextasha , Volume 3 of Pulse by Ratana Satis is available for Pre-order!

Also from Alextasha, the sad news that Ssamba, the creator of popular Korean Yuri webcomic, Fluttering Feelings, has passed away as a result of cancer. Sympathy to fans, friends, and family, for their loss.

Webcomic Hero-san to Onna Kanbu: Ai ga Tomaranai (ヒーローさんと女幹部さん　#1 愛が止まらない) on Pixiv is a fun read.

 

Live-Action

Today’s must-watch video is the teaser for NHK’s up-coming Otouto no Otto live-action miniseries based on Tagame Gengoroh-sensei’s series . To celebrate he drew a little cartoon. ^_^ I cannot wait to watch this. It’s going to be amazing.

ANN has the news that Sailor Moon Musical: Le Mouvement Final will be screened in selected US theaters.

 

Yuri VN

Fans of the Kiss for the Petal series will be happy, the new VN, A Kiss for the Petals: Maidens of Michaels was releases this week, from the folks at Mangagamers. You can buy this directly from Mangagamers.com, or on Steam.

 

Yuri Anime

ANN hosts a discussion on citrus anime by Michelle Liu and Steve Jones. I think they do a fair job of covering the weak and strong point. Jump in in the comments over there!

 

Other News

Prism Comics is accepting Submissions for the 2018 Queer Press Grant. Submissions are due by February 28th, so get those in!

 

Become a YNN Correspondent by reporting any Yuri-related news to anilesbocon01 at hotmail dot com with your name and an email I can reply to!

Thanks to all of you – you make this a great Yuri Network!

Posted in Yuri Network News | 4 Comments »


Yuri Manga: Sayuri-san no Imouto ha Tenshi, Volume 1 (小百合さんの妹は天使)

February 23rd, 2018

It’s come-clean time. We’re down to the dregs of the pile of my November impulse purchases. That means we’re scraping the bottom of the Yuri barrel. I’m probably not at the bottom yet, but this one is way down there.

  • Sayuri-san no Imouto ha Tenshi, Volume 1 (小百合さんの妹は天使) Yuri. I’m not denying that. And I acknowledge that what I like (sensible stories with great characters that work well together) is not what other people like. But. And I say this with my gentle voice, with all due respect, this book makes no fucking sense.

Sayuri and her little sister were separated when her parents divorced (because in the world of manga, kids are like endtables or armchairs. You get one and I get one.) Saiyuri, now an adult working at a flower shop, and living a normal, if bland life, misses her little sister, but apparently has no access to phones or computers. Or paper and pencil and stamps. Or transportation. So she has not seen her in 13 years,

So one day when she sees her sister again, she’s amazed! But her sister has a halo. And wings. 

Now, I’m just asking for a friend, here, but, if you saw a member of your immediately family with halo and wings, would you not immediately want to know how they died? And when? And then I would wonder why some other member of your immediate family neglected to mention this?  Of course Sayuri does none of these things.

So the book then goes forward with a generic incestuous relationship between Sayuri and her dead little sister.  

Ratings:

I did not pay full price for this book. I bought it at Book-Off for 260￥.There are three more volumes of the series, if this sounds like your preferred tincture of Lily.

Posted in Yuri Manga | 6 Comments »


LGBTQ: Hitori Koukan Nikki (一人交換日記)

February 22nd, 2018

“Dear Nagata Kabi-san, this is Nagata Kabi.”

We left Nagata-sensei at the end of Sabishi-sugi Rezu Fuzoku ni Ikimashita Report (さびしすぎてレズ風俗に行きましたレポ) (which was sold as My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness in English) looking at a building a life in the middle of crushing depression and a debilitating eating disorder. As the pages of Hitori Koukan Nikki (一人交換日記) open, she is still attempting to build that life with crushing depression and sudden, shocking fame. (How much fame? The cover of this book says that her first book has 4.8 million copies in print.) But no pressure.

Nagata-sensei’s journey is a merry-go-round. Left out of the normal development of human emotions and affection, she’s desperate to be loved, to be embraced, but incapable of functioning at the level she would need to build the relationships that provide those things. Torn between needing some kind of stability, and desiring adulthood and freedom, we see her moving in and out of her parent’s house over and over trying to find some kind of balance.

Determined to make it on her own, Nagata-sensei struggles with ever worsening depression – her darkness is very omnipresent in these pages, signified by increasing use of black in the art, as she all-but-literally drowns in her own misery. 

Nagata-sensei, though, really is determined and keeps working at her next book, this time for Shogakukan’s Big Comics Special. Although her story is fully autobiographical, it has enough general appeal to have a major publisher pick her up and run her work in their magazine. More success equals more pressure.

But, just when things seem too overwhelming, she meets someone. Someone who becomes important to her. For the first time in her life, Nagata-sensei is experiencing the kind of emotion she craves. And, miraculously, it’s returned. I won’t spoil the end of the book, because it made the rest of the book worth reading, frankly, and you too will be able to read it this June when it comes out as My Solo Exchange Diary from Seven Seas.

Let me editorialize here for a moment: I am convinced that the reason the first book sold so well was that it had “lesbian experience” in the title AND a relatable story for so many.  I bet this won’t sell nearly as well without the word “lesbian” in it. Why? Because Amazon does not have a Yuri or lesbian manga/comics category. So people put in the keyword lesbian to find stuff they might want. Then they read the description. No one  is going to find Hana & Hina Afterschool when looking for a “lesbian romance” because that phrase is never used in the description. How many people might have loved a cute, sweet lesbian romance? Who knows because the description calls it a “toy-shop romance.” This is why Amazon needs a Yuri category, but also why publishers have *got* to understand how description works and who it’s for. Because I feel so strongly about this, I’ve sent this all to Seven Seas. Update: Seven Seas tells me that they agree, and are putting this volume out as My Solo Exchange Diary: The Sequel to My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness.

Seven Seas does a reasonable job with description, compared with say, Yen, who use the surreally vague Japanese descriptions, but this one is just going to need some help to become as popular as the first volume. And it should be, Because it’s a harder read, but a better book.

It is a harder read. I squirmed during the chapters when her parents read her first book. Crushing depression is crushing, and I was feeling weighted down by Nagata-sensei’s struggle. And when she broke down after kissing someone she liked for the very first time in her life, I’m not ashamed to say I cried, too. Which is why I really liked the ending and very much look forward to Hitori Koukan Nikki, Part 2.

Ratings:

Art – 7 She definitely has a style
Story – 6 
Service – N/A, even when there is nudity
LGBTQ – 9

Overall – 8

I’m fascinated by the (maybe disproportionately?I don’t know) important role in the comics industry held by autobiographical comic essays both in the West and in Japan. 

 

Posted in LGBTQ, Nagata Kabi | 5 Comments »